I’m tragically late commenting on something new and different that Stern did at the 40th Anniversary Pinball Expo in Chicago that deals specifically with Insider Connected quests. And in this article, we will also cover the new “Unboxing” quest badges the IC team has offered that I’m much less excited about. I’ll leave that one for the end of this article and start with the much more positive.
Stern named these quests (pictured above) Machines of Mystery: A Pinball Expo 2024 Exclusive Quest, and here’s the description: “From October 17-19, a daily mystery riddle will be linked to a machine at the Stern booth at Pinball Expo 24. Solve the riddle and play the game you think it refers to. If you’re correct, a Flippy badge will appear in your IC account. Enjoy the challenge and keep it a secret to let others share in the fun!”
Perhaps it’s good that I “kept the secret” of what they cooked up to earn these exclusive badges pictured below:
Would love to see exclusive quests like these for at least the main pinball shows throughout the year. In the Pacific Northwest, at least one of these would be the NW Pinball & Arcade Show (see: ), then there’s the Texas Pinball Festival in Texas, the Chicago Pinball Expo in October, and certainly there are some others I’m not as familiar with.
Stern has offered many badges to be earned for playing in leaderboard tournaments at events and launch parties for quite some time now, but the special quest event mentioned for the 40th anniversary Pinball Expo is the first I’m aware of anyway — and feel free to correct me otherwise in the comments — that there has been a multi-quest, multi-badge special event.
This is a great idea for multiple reasons:
- Drives more interest in Stern products and services with IC players wanting to earn all the badges while at the show
- Something fun and cool to do during the show that’s active participation vs. passive events like sitting and watching talks/discussions
I’m sure there are plenty more winning reasons this is cool from a business and player standpoint.
Now, what about these new Unboxing badges?
Presumably, anybody buying a new in box machine should receive one of these when they unbox and setup their new Stern. Unfortunately, it seems that right now this only works for The Uncanny X-Men? Why do I say that? Well, I’ve bought two new in box games (Iron Maiden Premium and James Bond pro) in the last 45 days and neither one awarded any unboxing badge. Earlier this year, my son bought a Jaws premium in box and, again, he has no unboxing badge either.
Hopefully, Stern will go back and award these badges to people that register new machines to their account. This should be easy for Stern to track based on the machine ID as to which person registered these machines first, so, even if they don’t initially award this badge, they should be able to capture those that should have earned these badge(s).
I’m personally a fan of the badges, and I hope other companies think about incorporating them as well. I think having them extends the life of the game, and also encourages you to get out during events to play games you may not have tried yet.
Todd, I hope you are able to get the unboxing badges for the machines you own. I would also be annoyed if I wasn’t able to unlock it after purchasing a machine. I’m hoping they thought about this, and are working on a way to retroactively let people earn this.